04 January 2008
Rights of Americans Abroad
If Americans abroad don’t enjoy the same freedoms and rights they do at home, how can they be expected to represent our country’s values in foreign societies? It is disturbing to hear reports that the U.S. government has acted in spite of the Constitution to suspend certain of its guarantees to the country’s citizens, such as the Writ of Habeas Corpus and Fourth Amendment privacy rights.
This threat of unfettered surveillance and constraint by our own state apparatus sets a bad model for the behavior of American citizens and corporations abroad. On the other hand, it could be used to moderate the behavior of citizens and corporations in other countries so as not to create animosity toward the U.S. (In that case, a consensus must still be sought in America to authorize the government to prevent activities by its citizens abroad that may jeopardize their welfare and security.)
For example, the self-interested actions of U.S. corporations in the Middle East make them and Americans a target for misguided Islamic fundamentalists who seek to purify their own societies. The “struggle” within Islam that Stephen Gale writes about in his January 2, 2008 letter to the editor of the Wall Street Journal includes attempts by the members of the Islamic world to determine for themselves the features of their culture, even eliminating Western influence.
Attacking the seat of commercial predators on their countries, however, is not a good way to achieve the goal of restoring the Caliphate. It only invites retaliatory domination of the kind that led to the invasion of Iraq.
Our strategy in dealing with the terrorist attacks on our homeland should be to punish those responsible and to change our own behavior that provokes them to lash out at us. If it requires government regulation, so be it. We may have a free market at home, but most other countries where we try to make money and extract resources do not subscribe to that libertarian philosophy. Circumspection in our private and business actions in the Middle East will honor our hosts’ rights and protect our own welfare.
If Americans abroad don’t enjoy the same freedoms and rights they do at home, how can they be expected to represent our country’s values in foreign societies? It is disturbing to hear reports that the U.S. government has acted in spite of the Constitution to suspend certain of its guarantees to the country’s citizens, such as the Writ of Habeas Corpus and Fourth Amendment privacy rights.
This threat of unfettered surveillance and constraint by our own state apparatus sets a bad model for the behavior of American citizens and corporations abroad. On the other hand, it could be used to moderate the behavior of citizens and corporations in other countries so as not to create animosity toward the U.S. (In that case, a consensus must still be sought in America to authorize the government to prevent activities by its citizens abroad that may jeopardize their welfare and security.)
For example, the self-interested actions of U.S. corporations in the Middle East make them and Americans a target for misguided Islamic fundamentalists who seek to purify their own societies. The “struggle” within Islam that Stephen Gale writes about in his January 2, 2008 letter to the editor of the Wall Street Journal includes attempts by the members of the Islamic world to determine for themselves the features of their culture, even eliminating Western influence.
Attacking the seat of commercial predators on their countries, however, is not a good way to achieve the goal of restoring the Caliphate. It only invites retaliatory domination of the kind that led to the invasion of Iraq.
Our strategy in dealing with the terrorist attacks on our homeland should be to punish those responsible and to change our own behavior that provokes them to lash out at us. If it requires government regulation, so be it. We may have a free market at home, but most other countries where we try to make money and extract resources do not subscribe to that libertarian philosophy. Circumspection in our private and business actions in the Middle East will honor our hosts’ rights and protect our own welfare.
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